Neil deGrasse is Dropping "Football Astrophysics" on Us

Classic nerd.

Neil deGrasse Tyson is a brilliant scientist who seems like he would be a miserable companion if you like, had an extra ticket to a Jets game. The 58-year-old director of the Hayden Planetarium spent Super Bowl Sunday sharing some football astrophysics facts on Twitter.

“Momentum & energy transfer. Elastic & Inelastic Collisions. Spin-stabilized projectiles. Nothing like a good game of Football,” Tyson wrote before the kickoff, clearly leaning into his “well actually” nerd persona. The Cosmos host then proceeded to share some scientific Super Bowl trivia. Some of it was, to be honest, pretty loosely related to football.

“As space enthusiasts know, the first word of the first comment uttered by Neil Armstrong from the Moon’s surface is ‘Houston,’” Tyson wrote, since Super Bowl LI’s host city is also the NASA HQ mentioned in Neil Armstrong’s iconic “the Eagle has landed” quote.

“In North-South oriented stadiums, like NRG in Houston, Earth’s rotation deflects a 50-yd field goal to the right by 1/2 inch,” Tyson wrote.

Check out more of Tyson’s tweets below.

Momentum & energy transfer. Elastic & Inelastic Collisions. Spin-stabilized projectiles. Nothing like a good game of Football